needles. vectors. words. laughter.

Just write, they say

Just write. Write whatever comes to mind. Don’t edit. Go for what’s hard to talk about or embarrassing or crazy. Just write. Keep going until the twenty minutes you’ve been allotted have ended and you are forced to stop, even if it’s in the middle of the sentence.

But they don’t tell you what to actually write about, just to write about whatever it is that crosses your mind.

People who talk while they read drive me nuts. So do people who can’t communicate properly. Effectively. Effectively is the right word here. We just talk around one another, both of us maybe talking about the same thing but using different enough words that we can’t at all understand what the other person is thinking. We have to keep going back to teh basics – who did what. What did you search on. What data did you start the analysis with.

But it’s evening. I shouldn’t be thinking about and definitely shouldn’t be talking about work. No one wants to hear about that. I don’t even want to hear about that.

What else. What else.

California. I’m embarrassed to tell anyone that I watch if it but, you must admit, it’s a pretty great show. The characters have real relationships, messed up as they are. Charlie is really a great friend to Hank. Hank is an overgrown child. Overgrown? Adult child. Maybe. Yes, that’s it. Karen is lost in her head. Marcie is just sick. The daughter, wise for her age. But now gone. Europe, right? You can assume. No one takes a literary pilgrimage to New Jersey. And she added “abroad.” No one says they’re going abroad to Asia, though it is, you now, abroad. They said they’re going to the Far East or to Thailand or to some small village in the Himalayas. But not abroad. Abroad is to Europe.

But, back to Californication. It always inspires me to watch thats how. Inspires me not to sleep with random people or do drugs (never!) or to party with rock stars. But to write. Not that Hanky Moody does a whole ton of writing on the show. He just sleeps around and does drugs and takes his daughter for ice cream and ever, really, gets the girl. Or does he? WE’ve still got a few episodes of the last season to go. Time will tell. This one doesn’t seem as dark as the others. He’s not even wearing his black t-shirt anymore. The blue dress shirts really bring out his eyes.

But, writing. I’m inspired after I watch each episode, because Hank, in the end, is a writer. he writes books and for movies and even attempted to write for that rock opera for that crazy British guy Atticus Fetch. (My mom would find his name amusing, To Kill a Mockingbird is one of her favorite books, way back from when she taught ninth grade English. But she would hate everything about his life style, especially his bright red leather pants and messy hair.)

I always want to find myself a typewriter and sit, a glass of whiskey nearby, and write. But maybe not whiskey. I can’t drink that stuff for more than glass. Maybe white wine. Now I sound like an alcoholic. I rarely drink anything at all when I write. Maybe a bit of water or my blessed Diet, Caffeine Free Coke (fancy colored water, it is).

He’s got a way with words, that Hank Moody. Makes everything into a joke. But not a particularly clever joke. Well, clever but as told by a 12 year-old. And not a very mature one at that.

Writing straight for 20 minutes is hard. I should have set a timer. I’m just writing away, driving Matt crazy. He just got up and walked away, tired of sitting next to me as I ignored him. He was reading something on his iPad but gave up, going into his office to look at the same stupid crap on his actual computer rather than the iPad.

I keep checking how much time has passed. Started at 9:16, it’s 9:25. Do the math. Only nine minutes have passed. How can nine minutes last so very long?

Like when Squirms was only a few weeks old and it took FOREVER for her to drink her 2 oz bottle. I would be up with her at 3 am, begging her to just eat faster so I could pump and go back to bed. I loved my bed so much and just wanted to be back. Now she sleeps through the night. So I get a full night of sleep but I don’t get adorable baby snuggles at 3 am. Just an angry baby when she wakes up just before our alarm goes off at 5. She’s desperate for food, as soon as I’m up. But i do my thing first. Use the restroom. Grab her bottle. Disconnect the iPad from the charger. Because it’s 6 am and the snuggles I get are nice but I convince myself that checking my email and Facebook are more important than giving her my full attention. She just wants to eat, anyway. Or so I tell myself.

She stops halfway through her bottle, without fail. She straightens her back and pushes the bottle away. saying “mmm” because she’s had just enough to no longer be angry. So I bring her to me, giving her kisses on her cheeks like there’s no tomorrow. The iPad ignored until she’s ready for more, her desperate hands searching for the bottle again.

Why does my mind always go to her? She’s my everything. I say this, no thinking. But what about Matt? And the cats? And work? Family? Friends? Do I even have friends anymore? My best friend is in Cleveland and we barely talk, not that we don’t work at the same company and can use IM whenever. I don’t know what to say to her. Tell her about Squirms. Ask about her new house. Because it’s been too long since we’ve been in the same place. That was in May but seems like an eternity ago when it’s someone you used to see a few times a month. I suck at keeping in touch with people.

Five minutes left and my brain is nearly empty. It’s only Monday night and I’m already tired of this stupid week. So much on my shoulders at work, trying to fix things broken for awhile. Trying to establish a pattern without even having a desk assigned to me. Trying to shift to reporting to work an hour later, only managing to get in a few minutes after I used to at the old job because I’m so much closer now. Four more minutes and the noises in the house are loud. Cat snoring. Dishwasher going. Dryer making no noise because it dinged a few minutes ago and I’m still pretending I didn’t hear it, though it was silent then and Matt and I both stiffened when it played its song. I’ll deal with it tomorrow. I won’t. I’ll just fluff it, grab out an outfit, and tell myself I’ll deal with it after work.

After work. Plans for yogurt using a coupon. Thai chicken for dinner. Ugh. Dishes to be done. Stick dishes. But Squirms will get to try Thai food and probably love it. If only it were vegetables, too. She cracked up when I sang her the Veggietales theme song this afternoon. “If you like to talk to tomatoes…if a squash can make you smile.” How do I still remember that, fifteen years later? Why does the memory of the hairbrush song make me laugh? Staying up late, listening to the radio. The one Dj always played the Audio Adrenaline version as his signing off song. Wonder if he’s still there.

(Post script: I’m a bit more formally participating in the Writing 101 course here through WordPress. The first prompt was to just write for 20 minutes and post whatever craziness came to mind. The only edits are to fix spelling and typos so I could be understood.)